Monday, 26th February 2007

HEADLINES OF THE DAY

Biaggi and Toseland Light up Season Opener

Points tie for Suzuki and Honda riders after round one. Max Biaggi (Alstare Suzuki Corona Extra) and James Toseland (Hannspree Ten Kate Honda) powered to a win and second place apiece at Losail, after two terrific 18-lap contests under the hot Qatari sun. In a surprising raceday development 2006 World Champion Troy Bayliss (Ducati Xerox) was only fifth and eighth.

RACE ONE: Biaggi's astonishing victory was an impressive induction into World Superbike, winning at the first attempt and only finding one rider, second place man James Toseland, able to push him and his overall race package right to the end. Third placed Lorenzo Lanzi (Ducati Xerox) was some 13 seconds down, with the second Alstare Suzuki Corona Extra machine of Yukio Kagayama fourth.

RACE TWO Toseland had the dream start he desired, scoring the victory in race in near flawless style. Biaggi closed in on the final laps, but Toseland held on to score the win and thus 45 points in total, sharing the championship lead with Biaggi - although Toseland is shown on top of the standings because his race win came most recently. In third place, Superpole winner Troy Corser (Yamaha Motor Italia) did not have any repetition of the tyre trouble he had in race one (when he was ninth) and finished third on his R1, some seven seconds from Toseland. Source: SBK Official Site, 26th February 2007


INFO BOX

South Africa, Host of the 2010 World Cup
* South Africa is an African nation, the 25th largest in the world, and has an estimated population of 47million
* Sporting heroes of South Africa include golfer Gary Player, motorsport’s Jody Scheckter and swimmer Penny Heyns
* To celebrate the demise of apartheid in 1994, South Africa won the Ruby World Cup as hosts a year later
* In 2010, South Africa will host the world’s biggest event in sports, the FIFA World Cup
* The South African team has participated in two World Cups and is nicknamed ‘Bafana Bafana’
Source: Infostrada, January 2007


SPORTS SHORTS

* Korea’s Suwon Bluewings has announced it has been invited to join Premiership champion Chelsea and Major League Soccer (MLS) side LA Galaxy on a summer tour of the USA. Mexican side Tigres has also been invited to play in the tournament, which is expected to take place in July. Suwon is owned by Samsung Electronics, which also sponsors Chelsea. Source: Football Insider, 23rd February 2007

* The National Basketball Association took HD to another dimension last week with 3D HD coverage of the All-Star game in Las Vegas. The All-Star 3D HD offered the unique coverage produced with the help of camera technology company, Pace. The NBA used five of Pace's new Sports Fusion 3D HD camera systems to capture the action on the court. Each 3D HD camera used two Sony HD cameras working together - and operated as single camera - to create the 3D effect, with one camera recording the left eye and the other the right eye. Source: Sports Media, 23rd February 2007

* Major League Baseball was set to announce a deal with DirecTV for exclusive rights to the Extra Innings package of out-of-market games worth $700 million over seven years, prompting concerns among fans which do not have access to satellite television. Extra Innings gives viewers games from local markets other than their own. InDemand, which has distributed Extra Innings to the cable industry since 2002, lost its rights despite offering $70 million, three times more than it paid previously. Prompted by Sen. John Kerry, the deal is to be investigated by the country’s Federal Communications Commission. Source: Sportcal, 23rd February 2007

* The Argentinian soccer team is to play a friendly against Norway in Oslo on August 22. It will be only the second meeting between the two teams. The Argentine Football Association has also confirmed that the side will play Australia in Melbourne on June 6 as part of its preparations for the Copa America, the South American national teams competition, in Venezuela, which starts on June 26. Source: Sportcal, 23rd February 2007


MORE NEWS

Asia/Rights: i-Cable Shares Serie A

PCCW's new deal for Italian Serie A TIM football rights in Hong Kong (reported in Wednesday's Sports Media) is non-exclusive for the next three seasons from 2007-10. For the first time in Hong Kong, Serie A will be shared by the two pay-tv platforms, with PCCW's Now Broadband TV showing a minimum of 130 matches on the new Mega Sports Channel, and i-Cable TV showing 60 matches. The deals were forged by Media Partners & Silva and Dentsu, which have established a partnership to co-manage and co-distribute the Asian broadcast rights of Italian Serie A during the period.

Media Partners & Silva have also reached new deals in China, where CCTV secured the broadcasting rights of a package of 60 matches and Hi Sun Technology secured the new-media rights, while the main package is yet to be awarded. In Macau, TDM (Teledifusao de Macau) won the exclusive rights for all the matches distributed by Media Partners & Silva and Dentsu.

Vietnam Advertising acquired the broadcasting rights of 130 matches for Vietnam. In South Korea, MediaCorp secured the new media rights. All the packages guarantee Serie A wide coverage of live matches, local promotion - and a substantial increase in the licence fees. Source: Sports Media, 23rd February 2007

Global/General: 2006 Women's European Handball Championship

The 2006 Women’s European Handball Championship, which took place in Sweden, was the most extensively covered and viewed women’s tournament in the history of the event. A cumulative audience of more than 440 million viewers followed 502 hours of event coverage on television. The cumulative television audiences for both 2006 European competitions (men’s & women’s events combined) exceeded the benchmark level set in 2004 of a viewing audience of one billion worldwide.

The two tournaments, held in Switzerland and Sweden, reached a cumulative audience of 1.2 billion viewers, with more than 1,200 hours of programming. Both final matches were also transmitted by Eurosport Asia in the territories of Australia, Indonesia, the Maldives, Myanmar and Thailand. Worldwide news coverage with a record total duration of 1:15 hours was available trough Deutsche Welle TV, Sport News TV and Trans World Sport.

The broadcast report is based on an independent programme analysis, including information provided by broadcast partners worldwide. The report was compiled by the German communication research agency Sport+Markt AG on behalf of Infront Sports & Media AG, the EHF's exclusive television and marketing partner. Infront has acted as the EHF's exclusive commercial partner for 13 years. In 2004, both partners renewed their cooperation until 2010. Source: Sports e-Media, 23rd February 2007

Elsewhere/Broadcast: Sports on XM And Sirius; When Satellites Collide

US rivals XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio have announced intentions of merging to create a single satellite radio company, with a combined market value of approximately $13 billion. However, it does not have FCC approval yet. DirecTV and DISH Network attempted a satellite monopoly merger of their own but could not gain the support of the FCC. The reason being consumers would only have one option for satellite television.

The reason for XM and Sirius' desire to merge is pretty simple: both companies are bleeding money. The two satellite radio giants lost $1.5 billion combined in 2005, and the still unannounced 2006 figures are expected to be similar. In an arms race to acquire exclusive content both companies scrambled (and spent big dollars) to lock the broadcasting rights for sports.

So far Sirius has:
• Locked up NFL rights for $200 million plus stock options
• Bought the rights to NCAA's March Madness tournament
• Stolen the NASCAR Nextel Cup from XM
• All this plus landing the biggest radio free agent ever: Howard Stern for $500 million over five years.

Meanwhile, XM has:
• Forked over a $650 million payout to broadcast MLB games for 11 years and for the "Official satellite radio provider of Major League Baseball" tag line
• Secured rights to NHL

The large price tags for pro sports content effected each company’s ability to turn a profit. If the merger gets FCC approval, fans will have a single product to listen to practically any sport going on anywhere, as it happens. Source: BC Sports Writers, 23rd February 2007


ARTICLES, COMMENTS & OPINIONS

Indian Cricket Broadcast – Retrospect
(useful read to understand cricket’s recent turbulent broadcast history in India)

Indian cricket allows for brash and innovative deal making. There is a lot of money riding on Indian cricket and poor management at all levels makes it very difficult to decide exactly what the size of the potential is. This results in heavy speculation. No sports anywhere in the world has seen television rights value multiplying like the way Indian cricket has.

Before Jagmohan Dalmiya and IS Bindra started managing BCCI, Indian cricket matches were broadcast by state owned Doordarshan. DD made all the money (or none at all) and never thought of actually paying BCCI. DD probably thought it was its divine right to produce and broadcast cricket (and other sports) staged in the country. On its part, BCCI also did not know that it can ask the telecaster for a rights fee.

In 1993, BCCI for the first time tried to get a private broadcaster to produce the Hero Cup and sell broadcast rights to a private channel. This resulted in DD blocking the coverage by unfair means. Indian Customs authorities were used to block cameras from being taken into the country. VSNL (at that time owned by the government), an uplinking company, was forced to not uplink the television signals. This resulted in a court battle, at the end of which it was established firmly that BCCI could sell cricket telecast rights.

By then, India had started on liberalising private TV channels, transmitting through satellite. ESPN came to India, and so did Star Sports. Both these channels looked to cricket as a big growth engine and out-doing each other to get those rights, jacking up the fees. Then, the two channels merged to create ESPN-Star Sports.

TWI also negotiated a deal to bring Indian cricket to C&S television from 1995-1999 on ESS. The five year deal was valued at approximately USD 5 million. This was also the period that saw Harsha Bhogle fronting cricket commentary for ESPN and technological innovation started coming into Indian cricket production. ESPN-Star Sports also brought overseas cricket to India, matches involving India as well as matches between other teams.

This was the golden period for Jagmohan Dalmiya as he consolidated his position in BCCI. In between, the 1996 World Cup happened, jointly organized by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka (PILCOM) which was produced by Worldtel of Mark Mascarenhas. (Today Dalmiya is accused of embezzlement during that World Cup and has been stripped off his posts and memberships and is facing criminal prosecution.)

Meanwhile, Dalmiya squeezed himself into a powerful position in ICC as its President and set out generating money for ICC. He created the concept of ICC Championship Trophy (also called mini world cup). The 1999 World Cup in England did not generate income for ICC, but the subsequent Wills Knockout in Bangladesh did. Since then, ICC events have been generating massive revenue. (The latest ICC global rights sold for around $1 billion to ESPN-Star Sports.)

When the Indian cricket rights were up for renewal in 1999, Prasar Bharati emerged as a surprise winner. The state-owned broadcaster agreed to pay the cricket board $54 million (Rs 227 crores) for five years (from Sep 1999 to Apr 2004). ESPN-Star Sports and other private players were beaten, and the rights fee jumped ten fold from $5 to $54 million!

Now Prasar Bharati set out to maximise its revenues. It ran the first series - India vs New Zealand - shoddily. Then, under Rajiv Ratna Shah, set out to generate income for the remaining 4.5 years of rights. It broke the rights into two parts - overseas distribution and India airtime rights, for the telecast in Doordarshan channels.

The airtime sales rights were picked up by an associate company of Zee Telefilms called Buddha Films, which bid a massive $120 million (Rs. 450 crores) for the same. Other bidders were TWI-Stracon and Nimbus. TWI-Stracon, however won the overseas distribution contract by bidding $43.75 million. Thus, within six months, Prasar Bharati turned the $54 million contract around for more than $160 million.

TWI, for its part, wrote into the contract just about everything it could, and created a funny thing called "multimedia rights" which was so poorly defined. Prasar Bharati thought it still had the "Internet rights" which it could sell further. Prasar Bharati decided to offer non-exclusive Internet rights for all comers at "an annual license fee of Rs. 25 lakh" which included "scoreboard, analysis, graphics, stills (up to 30 frames per minute from the live signal) and interviews with players (this may include pitch report, weather report, interview on the captains, players and experts)."

But it added, "if the license-holder, however, desires to have live and delayed streaming audio and video after obtaining the Internet rights from Prasar Bharati, it will have to approach Stracon-TWI who hold the multimedia rights. In the end, none of the Internet portals bought the Internet rights from Prasar Bharati. But TWI found a sucker in PCCW's now.com and sold a bunch of things to them including live video streaming, some kind of extended highlights for their TV operation etc. for something amounting well over $26 million.

When PCCW sort of collapsed, TWI brokered a deal selling the rights held by Now.com to ESPN-Star Sports. This resulted in ESPN-Star Sports running extended highlights for India matches (running over 3 hours each day!). This resulted in Prasar Bharati suing them, and getting an injunction in the courts preventing ESPN-Star Sports from broadcasting these extended highlights.

It was clear that when this set of rights came to an end, BCCI will look at getting even more from its rights and the fight for the rights will be acrimonious. That is what happened, and a period of chaos ensued.Dalmiya still had control over the BCCI. He was in charge of rights negotiations. ESPN-Star Sports was the front runner. Prasar Bharati was not going to get involved in the bidding game in a big way as it was pushing the government to come up with a legislation for any winning bidder to share the terrestrial rights with Prasar Bharati on a revenue-sharing basis.

Sony Entertainment Television had acquired ICC rights during this period for a whopping sum. Zee was aggressively looking at expanding into DTH space. Both were going to bid. Ten Sports, another sports channel was also in the fray.

The BCCI bid document was quite harsh as it demanded substantial experience in showing International cricket in its channels for two years. In the end, Zee bid $260 million (Rs 1200 crores) for four years. ESPN had bid $230 million, Sony TV at $140 million and Ten Sports at $115 million. But the story did not end there. BCCI disqualified Zee's bid on technical grounds and invited ESPN for further negotiations.

This resulted in Zee going to court against ESPN and BCCI. Nothing happened for the next year or so. The courts ruled that till the cases were disposed off, Prasar Bharati will show the matches in Doordarshan and will keep an account of the money. In between, a further rebid happened, further lawsuits, further chaos.

Then, a palace coup happened and Dalmiya was removed from BCCI, Sharad Pawar, a Union Minister won, and took control of BCCI. This resulted in all earlier bids being withdrawn and a new bidding process put in place. Various cases were withdrawn.

In the meantime, the government had come up with broadcast regulation rules which stated that any private channel having telecast rights to any cricket event (whether staged within India or outside) must share the clean feed with Prasar Bharati for terrestrial broadcast on a revenue-sharing basis. Ten Sports contested this in courts and kept winning. Still, everyone thought the BCCI rights values will be lower because of government rules.

However, Nimbus came from nowhere to bid a massive $612 million for the next four years (March 1, 2006 to March 31, 2010) during which time there was a guarantee of 22 Tests and 55 ODIs to be played. Thus, in three successive terms, the rights fee has jumped from $5 million (5 years) to $54 million (5 years) to $612 million (4 years).

Meanwhile, the government came up with an ordinance forcing private broadcasters to share the matches with Doordarshan. Nimbus refused and offered only a time-delayed (7 minutes) feed to Doordarshan. This prompted the government to issue a show-cause notice to Nimbus. On the other hand, TRAI - the broadcasting regulator attacked Nimbus' pricing policies.

Four metro cities were being moved into CAS (Conditional Access System), where TRAI had mandated that each channel must be priced only at Rs. 5 (whether it is a sports channel or a movie channel or a nothing channel!), and in non-CAS areas, the pricing must be discussed with TRAI first and only with the approval of TRAI, the pricing can be enforced.

Nimbus had, in the meantime, done a deal with Star distribution to distribute its channels, and Star had promised a minimum guarantee of approximately Rs. 600 crores to Nimbus for the four-year period. The two channels were priced at Rs. 58.50 but TRAI hads slashed them to Rs 37.25 for non-CAS areas and Rs. 5 each for CAS areas. This is going to seriously impact Star and Nimbus' revenues. Another thing that will impact Nimbus' advertising revenues will be whether the government's ordinance can withstand judicial review.

The government is also trying to talk to BCCI and the channels in sorting out the sports broadcast ordinance. But BCCI will mostly side with Nimbus and sports channels on this one. A lot will depend on the judiciary now.

BCCI has, in the meantime, also created a new set of overseas rights, where it will conduct matches in neutral venues like Malaysia, USA, Dubai and so on. Telecast rights for such matches have been sold off to Zee for $ 219.15 million for five years (April 1, 2006 to Mar 31, 2011), during which time at least25 matches will be conducted. BCCI and ICC have made a lot of money from Indian television channels. It is not clear whether the numbers can be justified in the long run though. Badri Sheshadri comments on his blog, 24th February 2007